Hieroglyphics

Hieroglyphics—Introduction By: Sofia Schmidt and Prarthana Venkatesh 6B  Hieroglyphics are so important that it was used as inspiration for lots of alphabets—the beginning of writing. Ancient Egyptians believed it to be invented by the god Thoth. It started in 3400 BCE, around the same time as the Sumerian writing system was invented, making it the one of the oldest known writing systems.

When we say ‘hieroglyphics’ we usually mean Egyptian writing in general, but did you know there are other versions of Egyptian writing? To be exact, there are three other kinds— cursive hieroglyphic, hieratic and demotic are all less formal versions of hieroglyphs. These developed as soon as writing started to spread. Demotic script is used for normal people for normal occasions, and hieratic is used by priests. Real hieroglyphs were only used for formal occasions and monumental writings.

Hieroglyphics could be a little confusing at times—the direction of the writing varied—it could be meant to be read horizontally left to right, right to left, or vertically top to bottom. Luckily you can tell the direction of the writing by looking at the direction the animals are facing—they look towards the beginning. Also sometimes the arrangement is taken into artistic consideration—it seems the Egyptians didn’t like to waste papyrus so they some times would combine letters.  The History of Hieroglyphics  The writing system of the ancient Egyptians is very historical-- it’s believed to date back to 3400 BCE. The system of the writing went through many changes. In the Old, Middle, and New Kingdoms there were only about 800 symbols but in the Greco-Roman era there was 5,000 symbols! They were first used by Clement of Alexandria, and they were last used in 396 CE when Emperor Theodsius I ordered closure of all pagan temples. Later hieroglyphics were rediscovered again in 1799 with the finding of the Rosetta stone.

The Egyptians believed that hieroglyphics were invented by the god Thoth, therefore calling them //god’s words// or //mdwt ntr//. . The Rosetta Stone The Rosetta stone was a very important contribution towards the understanding and decoding of hieroglyphics. It was a carved text of one passage in three different languages- classical Greek, and two Egyptian languages, hieroglyphic and Demotic. It was created in 196 B.C.E, and discovered by the French in 1799.   A lot of effort was made in trying to understand the Rosetta stone in 1822 by a British scientist named Thomas Young and a French scholar, Jean-Francois Champollion. In 1814, Thomas Young finished translating the demotic text, and began to work on the hieroglyphic script. Jean- Francois could read both Greek and Coptic, and he figured out what the seven demotic signs in Coptic were, by the way they were used in the writing, he later figured out what they meant. Then he traced the Demotic signs back to hieroglyphic signs. By working out what some of the hieroglyphics stood for, he translated the text from the Demotic and Greek to the Hieroglyphs. From that, he created an alphabet to decipher all the writings of Ancient Egypt.